History and Evaluation of Operating System

This is an article on History and Evaluation of Operating System in Operating System.

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An operating system can be defined as:

An operating system is a program that acts as an interface or intermediary between the user of a computer and the computer hardware.

An operating system exploits the hardware resources of one or more processors to provide a set of services to system users and also manages secondary memory and Input/Output devices on the behalf of its users.

An operating system is a set of program modules which provides a friendly interface between the user and the computer resources such as processors, memory, Input/Output devices and information.

OBJECTIVES AND FUNCTIONS

Convenience

The primary goal of an operating system is convenience for the user. If an application program is a set of machine instructions then it is completely responsible for controlling the computer hardware. It is a complicated task. To simplify this task, a set of system programs are provided, called utilities and they implement frequently used functions which assist in program creation, management of files and control of Input/Output devices.

Efficiency

The secondary goal of an operating system is efficient operation of the system. Operating system is responsible for managing the resources. That is the movement, storage and processing of data.A portion of operating system is in main memory. This includes the Kernel or nucleus, which contains the most frequently used functions in the operating system. The remainder of main memory contains other user programs and data. Operating system determine how much processor time is to be devoted to the execution of a program. That is the efficient utilization of the resources.

Ability to Evolve

Operating system should be constructed in such a way as to permit the effective development, testing, and introduction of new system functions.

Operating system will evolve over time for a number of reasons:

Hardware upgrades plus new types of hardware. For example, view several applications at the same time through windows.

New services, that is new measurement and control tools may be added.

Fixes, that is faults will be discovered and fixes.

BASIC ELEMENTS

Processor

Processor controls the operation of computer and performs its data processing functions like arithmetic, logic and others.

Main Memory

Main memory is also called as volatile memory, primary memory, real memory or temporary memory, because it stores data and programs temporarily during the processing time only.

Input/Output Modules

Input/Output modules move data between the computer and its external environment like secondary memory, communications equipment and terminals etc.

System Inter Connection

System inter connection provide some structure and mechanisms that provide for communication among processors, main memory and Input/Output modules.

EVOLUTION OF OPERATING SYSTEMS

Serial Processing

Users access the computer in series. From the late 1940's to mid 1950's, the programmer interacted directly with computer hardware i.e., no operating system. These machines were run with a console consisting of display lights, toggle switches, some form of input device and a printer. Programs in machine code are loaded with the input device like card reader. If an error occur the program was halted and the error condition was indicated by lights. Programmers examine the registers and main memory to determine error. If the program is success, then output will appear on the printer.

Main problem here is the setup time. That is single program needs to load source program into memory, saving the compiled (object) program and then loading and linking together.

Simple Batch Systems

To speed up processing, jobs with similar needs are batched together and run as a group. Thus, the programmers will leave their programs with the operator. The operator will sort programs into batches with similar requirements.

The problems with Batch Systems are:

Lack of interaction between the user and job.

CPU is often idle, because the speeds of the mechanical I/O devices are slower than CPU.

For overcoming this problem use the Spooling Technique. Spool is a buffer that holds output for a device, such as printer, that can not accept interleaved data streams. That is when the job requests the printer to output a line, that line is copied into a system buffer and is written to the disk. When the job is completed, the output is printed. Spooling technique can keep both the CPU and the I/O devices working at much higher rates.

Multiprogrammed Batch Systems

Jobs must be run sequentially, on a first-come, first-served basis. However when several jobs are on a direct-access device like disk, job scheduling is possible. The main aspect of job scheduling is multiprogramming. Single user cannot keep the CPU or I/O devices busy at all times. Thus multiprogramming increases CPU utilization.

In when one job needs to wait, the CPU is switched to another job, and so on. Eventually, the first job finishes waiting and gets the CPU back.

The memory layout for multiprogramming system is shown below:

Time-Sharing Systems

Time-sharing systems are not available in 1960s. Time-sharing or multitasking is a logical extension of multiprogramming. That is processors time is shared among multiple users simultaneously is called time-sharing. The main difference between Multiprogrammed Batch Systems and Time-Sharing Systems is in Multiprogrammed batch systems its objective is maximize processor use, whereas in Time-Sharing Systems its objective is minimize response time.

Multiple jobs are executed by the CPU by switching between them, but the switches occur so frequently. Thus, the user can receives an immediate response. For example, in a transaction processing, processor execute each user program in a short burst or quantum of computation. That is if n users are present, each user can get time quantum. When the user submits the command, the response time is seconds at most.

Operating system uses CPU scheduling and multiprogramming to provide each user with a small portion of a time. Computer systems that were designed primarily as batch systems have been modified to time-sharing systems.

For example IBM's OS/360.

Time-sharing operating systems are even more complex than multiprogrammed operating systems. As in multiprogramming, several jobs must be kept simultaneously in memory.

Personal-Computer Systems (PCs)

A computer system is dedicated to a single user is called personal computer, appeared in the 1970s. Micro computers are considerably smaller and less expensive than mainframe computers. The goals of the operating system have changed with time; instead of maximizing CPU and peripheral utilization, the systems developed for maximizing user convenience and responsiveness.

For e.g., MS-DOS, Microsoft Windows and Apple Macintosh.

Hardware costs for microcomputers are sufficiently low. Decrease the cost of computer hardware (such as processors and other devices) will increase our needs to understand the concepts of operating system. Malicious programs destroy data on systems. These programs may be self-replicating and may spread rapidly via worm or virus mechanisms to disrupt entire companies or even worldwide networks.

MULTICS operating system was developed from 1965 to 1970 at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) as a computing utility. Many of the ideas in MULTICS were subsequently used at Bell Laboratories in the design of UNIX OS.

Parallel Systems

Most systems to date are single-processor systems; that is they have only one main CPU. Multiprocessor systems have more than one processor.

The advantages of parallel system are as follows:

throughput (Number of jobs to finish in a time period)

Save money by sharing peripherals, cabinets and power supplies

Increase reliability

Fault-tolerant (Failure of one processor will not halt the system).

Symmetric multiprocessing model

Each processor runs an identical job (copy) of the operating system, and these copies communicate. Encore's version of UNIX operating system is a symmetric model.
E.g., If two processors are connected by a bus. One is primary and the other is the backup. At fixed check points in the execution of the system, the state information of each job is copied from the primary machine to the backup. If a failure is detected, the backup copy is activated, and is restarted from the most recent checkpoint. But it is expensive.

Asymmetric multiprocessing model

Each processor is assigned a specific task. A master processor controls the system. Sun's operating system SunOS version 4 is a asymmetric model. Personal computers contain a microprocessor in the keyboard to convert the key strokes into codes to be sent to the CPU.

Distributed Systems

Distributed systems distribute computation among several processors. In contrast to tightly coupled systems (i.e., parallel systems), the processors do not share memory or a clock. Instead, each processor has its own local memory.

The processors communicate with one another through various communication lines (such as high-speed buses or telephone lines). These are referred as loosely coupled systems or distributed systems. Processors in a distributed system may vary in size and function. These processors are referred as sites, nodes, computers and so on.

The advantages of distributed systems are as follows:

Resource Sharing: With resource sharing facility user at one site may be able to use the resources available at another.

Communication Speedup: Speedup the exchange of data with one another via electronic mail.

Reliability: If one site fails in a distributed system, the remaining sites can potentially continue operating.

Real-time Systems

Real-time systems are used when there are rigid time requirements on the operation of a processor or the flow of data and real-time systems can be used as a control device in a dedicated application. Real-time operating system has well-defined, fixed time constraints otherwise system will fail.

Hard real-time systems gurantees that critical tasks complete on time. In hard real-time systems secondary storage is limited or missing with data stored in ROM. In these systems virtual memory is almost never found.

Soft real-time systems

Soft real time systems are less restrictive. Critical real-time task gets priority over other tasks and retains the priority until it completes. Soft real-time systems have limited utility than hard real-time systems.